Instant Gratification

Instant gratification can be had for good and bad.  For the most part you don't have to wait to go to the bookstore when you can download.  Pizza can now be ordered online and it's process of construction, oven entering, and delivery can all be viewed while waiting.  It's great, it's progress, but we must remember to use our intellectual skills to realize when it can be misleading.

I love to look things up on Wiki at times.  If it's for fun I'll read it, maybe click on a link or two, and I'm done.  But if it's something that I really need a trusted answer for then I will see what Wiki states and then research it by way of trusted sources. 

They don't have the manpower (I believe the article mentioned 4 or 8 employees) to check all of the entries, and I think that's a shame.  I would love to be able to go to Wiki for instant gratification for research and be done with it.  Life would be simpler and we could move along much more quickly.  Unfortunately that is not the case and until they incorporate careful screening of the information it isn't a good source for solid information.  But it's still fun!!

Bravo, Eliza!

I bow to Eliza Doolittle!  She knew the hand she was dealt and played it well.  Running off to Henry's mother and rehashing her life with him and Pickering was superb intelligence.  Henry's mother would never tolerate Eliza to be dismissed unfairly and guarded her from any further games Henry and Pickering may have been interested in playing.  She came through proving that she was even more intelligent and cunning than the two men in securing her future from a different angle.

While the play wrapped up in a pretty little package in the end, as I turned the pages I kept waiting for Mr. Doolittle to offer up a type of dowry or trust fund for his daughter and her new husband.  Did he know Pickering still felt obligated to fund Eliza's future?  And will Henry and Pickering remain indebted to Eliza, though Henry may fool himself into believing Eliza is indebted to him?  There are some stories that should never end....

Where is Kermie???

Okay, where are the pigs in this play?  :)

I have really been enjoying this play.  I do tend to form an opinion about a person by their dialect and have been able to place their region of development, but not as succinctly as in Pygmalion.  I can tell if one is from South Jersey, North Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, or the South, basics as such, but if I were to be studied enough to recognize a form of speech within a few blocks of where they lived, I would have to play psychic and freak them out just for entertainment.

What really stood out to me was the way he treated the people he met.  Those with a more sophistacated dialect he treated with respect, and the street urchin he seemed to be rude to.  I honestly hope this is something I don't do and will try to be more aware of it in the future to get an idea.

A man's goal

Honestly, I had to shake my head and laugh when I read, "I would love you ten years before the Flood; And you should, if you please, refuse Till the conversion of the Jews."  An obvious indication that he'll wait for his mistress forever is used as a frame of seduction to warm her soul and soften her resistance to his charm and desires.  Through the ages men have been creative in their pursuit of attaining sexual favors from women, however, the pattern is always the same.  Make her feel special, there is no one else you want but her, and then go in for the kill with tactics of pressure.  Time is running out; we don't have forever; we're getting old; just give it to me and I will cherish you eternally.  The sentiment remains the same, only the faces change.

Female influence an illusion

Lyn Pykett brings our attention to the limits of a woman's influence in the Victorian Era. (472).  While Heathcliff and Linton both had a strong desire and need for Catherine, she still was the one who had to bow down to their wishes.  Pykett points out that it doesn't matter how powerful a woman of that times influence was, she was still legally controlled by the male gender of the family.  This included everyone from the father, to the brother, and the husband.  And while they competed for Catherine's affection it wasn't truly her that they wanted, but their version of who she should be according to their rule.  It must have been so confusing in those days for a woman having to please everyone by being someone you are not.  It's no wonder that so many of these women were plagued with unhappiness, and in Catherine's case even unto death.  She claimed that Heathcliff and Linton had broken her heart when they wouldn't succumb to her subtleties and forge a friendship that would please her.  What has surprised me is that no one has alluded to the possibility of polyandry being a motive, or solution.  Isn't that what really broke her heart, that she couldn't have both the men as she pleased?  Hmmm, it makes you wonder.

Catherine a Gemini?

"I am Heathcliff!" (p. 88).  Terry Eagleton points out that Catherine has to contend with two avenues of thinking.  On one hand she desires to adhere to social convention by entering into a marriage with Linton while her heart firmly belongs to Heathcliff.  By utilizing the previous statement Catherine is able to feel Heathcliff within her and can move away from him to join Linton who is seemingly a more suitable husband.  This foolish attempt at duality instigates a myraid of problems among those who are involved and will ultimately cause her death.  Having created an unbreakable bond between them they were more of an offshoot of the Earnshaw family exclusively exploring life and experiencing the Moors without interruption.  As Eagleton points out, "...Heathcliff is a purely atomized individual, free of generational ties in a novel where genealogical relations are of crucial thematic and structural importance..." (p. 398).  How would this have turned out if Heathcliff had been fairskinned?  Would there have been a possiblity of the two entering into marriage?

Grave Revenge

I lingered round them, under that benign sky; watched the moths fluttering among the heath, and hare-bells; listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass, and wondered how anyone could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth.  pg. 288

I absolutely love the illusion this last paragraph creates.  A whole new existence under the coffins where the three spirits of Catherine, Linton, and Heathcliff, are still at war with one another.  Their passion so ultimate and unceasing to continue into eternity.  Will this love triangle never end?  Does Catherine's spirit still hold on to the words she spoke to Nelly Dean when she was alive; I am Heathcliff?  Is Heathcliff finally satisfied with his revenge?  Bronte ends the story leaving me with the feeling that it is not over, and perhaps, never will be. Death is unable to put these three to rest.  

Forever their spirits will roam the earth searching for the peace needed to move on.  Heathcliff would not allow himself to die straight after Catherine because he first needed to exact his revenge.  That revenge kept him alive for 18 years, therefore, did he not want revenge against life, also?  How far did this revenge go?  I would have thought that once his revenge was fulfilled and he could join Catherine in the earth, then certainly all would be well.  However, Bronte specifically states, unquiet slumbers for the sleepers.  How ironic when I would imagine a final happiness, their spirits dancing, and singing, would have been the end of a tortured existence.  

Heathcliff the original Grinch?

When I started to contemplate what I had read in Wuthering Heights, and what to write in this blog I found my thoughts turning to The Grinch.  Not so much the original cartoon as the newer version starring Jim Carrey.  I would never have expected to compare the two, but it rings of the same premise.  The Grinch had been raised in a community that had rejected him because he did not look like the others in Whoville.  He was green and hairy and slightly unkempt looking with all of his facial hair.  The Who's were a delightful looking people and looked down on the young Grinch often causing him great unhappiness.  He was teased, and taunted, never accepted, but admired by one girl (sorry, I can't remember her name).  Heathcliff, being dark haired, dark skinned, and having a dark mood was also different from the family his "father" brought him home to.  In both of these stories the main character is rejected by the whole for being different.  They both suffered with internal strife for the love they felt for the only females that would capture their hearts.  But this love was unacceptable, and the women turned their affections to men who were acceptable to the society they grew in.  Wracked with such pain Heathcliff and the Grinch exiled themselves outside of the community until the time was right to return.  Their hearts, in the meantime, were filled with such hatred for those who chastised them, and they were focused on revenge. 

On the Decline of Language

This has been a difficult idea for me as I do love the proper use of language.  I found myself having to remember that we are talking about language and politics rather than language and literature.  I find it difficult to read a piece of work that is not well written and usually give up at some point and stop reading it.  But when we marry it with politics and having to get a message across to the American people, ALL the American people (this includes non-traditional American citizens), than yes, using what Orwell refers to as a "decline of language" is necessary.  Your neighbor, co-worker, or friend may not have had the opportunity to be educated to a degree where proper usage of the English language is easy for them to understand.  Is this their fault?  Maybe, maybe not.  Maybe it was just enough for them to learn English as a second, maybe even third or fourth language.  So would that mean that they should not be entitled to a form of speech that they would understand?  After all, this is their country also and they should not be discouraged to get involved because it is "above their heads".

I could understand Orwell's views, except concerning foriegn language, if it were a literary or scholarly speech.  But that is not what he was discussing.  He was focusing on politics, and politics are for everyone, the educated and the uneducated alike must know, and are absolutely entitled to know the current events of the country they live in.

History of Reading

I found an interesting point of the book that I had to keep reading over and over.  And that was how the very first books were created.  The papyrus that was made out of "dried and split stems of a reed-like plant", and parchment, or vellum, "both made from the skins of animals, through different procedures".   Parchment folded once became a folio, twice a quarto, three times on octavo.  I love the history of reading and how it came about, and including the history of the creation of books was such a thrill. 

The exactness ordered by a King was not only a necessity, but a law, and the production of papyrus was even considered a national secret.  The importance of books can be found in many aspects when looking back over their history.  Man has always wanted to communicate and has found the most imaginitive ways, from carving on sticks to drawing on cave walls.  It just amounts to the simple fact that written communication will continue in one form or another.

Imagination Lost

What I would have liked to see addressed in this article is the loss of imagination, individualism, and free thought.  In my experience I have enjoyed reading great works, sharing them with others, and then going to see the movie.  I have found it very interesting that the other people whom I have shared the book with, and the creators of the movie, all interpreted the literature with different views.  How fascinating that the layers of the story were revealed when we were left to our own means of understanding.  And when putting it all together it gains depth and richness that I would not have experienced on my own.  I don't want instant gratification of a good story seen through a director's eyes without me having the joy of first living through the tale myself.  Our world was built on ingenuity and imagination.  I wonder if that would slowly come to a halt if we allowed ourselves to only experience literature on  a screen. 

Hi everyone!  Hmmm, a little about me.  I have 3 grown children who are in different states going to college, and a 5 year old son, whose arrival in my world was a complete surprise, who lives with me.  We have an overgrown puppy, 1 cat, and 3 lizards.  When the weather is nice I like to take my son out for a ride on my Harley Sportster.  He swears it's a rocket Autobot and we seem to always be on the way to take down Megatron.